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Bucketology: The Definitive Guide to Oil Panic (Back in action as of 3.6)

Introduction:
So in an old thread I made a "tier list" of absorbable moves, but it was based only on my old brawl knowledge and experience and, to put it frankly, it was wrong. So here it is a proper study on bucketology, enjoy.

The Basics:
Game & Watch's Down-B, Oil Panic or simply "The Bucket" is a move that many players might want to call a projectile counter, but in reality it doesn't quite follow that moniker at all. It doesn't absorb all projectiles, nor does it limit it's consumption to to only projectiles, nor does it directly counter them. What it does do is suck up certain moves which later can be used to return his own attack. The damage this attack deals is based on the amount of damage the move has previously absorbed. So the less damage G&W has bucketed the less damage he will use to counter, while the more damage he snags the more he dishes out, with one added rule (more on that later). In Project:M G&W can bucket up to three moves and release his attack anytime as long as he has at least one move swallowed to throw back. The more attacks he has in the bucket the bigger the counter attack will be. With the three projectile attack having a massive hitbox.

The List:
This is the complete list of absorbable moves and how much damage they do.
Remember that Oil Panic's attack damage is directly linked to how much damage G&W has absorbed.

The Twist:
Despite the range of absorbable move power, Oil Panic only counts damages between 0 and 8. Which means and move that gets absorbed and would have done more than 8 damage will be capped and is counted as 8. Mario's fireball is 100% equivalent to a Mega Aura Sphere from Lucario. This means that focusing on absorbing dangerous high powered moves is fruitless, but it also means that quite a few mid ranged attacks are incredibly potent.

The Math:
So the maximum damage Bucket can consume is 8, and the minimum damage it can absorb is less than one. So how does all of that work out as G&W grabs multiple attacks, and how much damage can Oil Panic do? For all intents and purposes it follows a linear progression where as the total damage absorbed increase they add together and result in increased bucket damage.

The chart only goes up to 24/60 because that is the damage cap for the move. 24 is a full bucket of all 8 damage moves (8x3). As you can see, there is also a hard limit on the minimum damage a bucket can do set at 10.

The Rest:There is a lot of confusion over what moves can and cannot be absorbed. Most of this stems from the possibilities created by anomalous Down Smash of Zero Suit Samus. Which is the only absorbable non-Special Attack. There are also quite a few instances of projectile type moves that cannot be bucketed. Or otherwise attacks that look like they could be "energy" based, So just to get them out there the following moves CANNOT be absorbed into the bucket:

Aura Sphere is just a good to absorb at zero charge as it is as a Mega Aura Sphere

Squirtle's Water Gun and Bubbles are bucketable

Din's Fire is very difficult to absorb

Wolf's Blaster at max range is about as good as Fox or Falco's at close range

At 60 Damage Oil Panic is the most powerful single hit in the game tied only by Marth's final smash

The Conclusion:
Like the rest of his repertoire Game & Watch's Down B has a life of it's own in Project:M. You can't base your understanding of the move on what worked in previous versions of Smash. The new bucket is a powerful move, with a fresh design that changes the way G&W aproaches many projectiles he used to know.

Something to note about the bucket... you can turn it around right after you do it so that there is a hitbox just in front of you, turn, full hitbox behind you. Its neat but it has little practical use outside of teams and trolling...

Well, 3.5 made the damage uniform across all absorbed projectiles (12%), so the damage counts here no longer apply. Oil Panic still absorbs the same stuff, so this thread isn't totally useless.

This also means that moves that instant-fill the bucket (Squirtle's Bubble Beam) means turtles get rekt.

Click to expand...

does that mean a full bucket in 3.5 will always deal even more than 60 damage? or did the way outputted damage scales get changed to account for flatlining everything to 12%, cause that seems like a MASSIVE ****ing buff if the output scales the same.

(I realise now you may have meant that 12% is the set output damage for each absorbed projectile, if so does it just always stack up to 36?)

Charges (the bars that represent how full the bucket is) are now the only factor that will increase the damage of Oil Panic. They are the only thing that the move's damage will scale off of in 3.5.

Each individual projectile will fill the bucket with one charge. The amount of damage the attack deals when the bucket is released is equal to the amount of charges it had at the time, but multiplied by 12. The damage that the absorbed projectile would have dealt has absolutely no bearing on how much damage the bucket deals as of 3.5.

Oil Panic will now always deal 36% if the bucket has absorbed 3 projectiles regardless of what was absorbed. Absorbing Lucario's Spirit Bomb or Mewtwo's fully charged Shadow Ball will still only grant one charge to the bucket that will deal 12% when released. A single ember from Charizard's Flamethrower will fill the bucket in exactly the same way and deal exactly the same amount of damage, but Flamethrower releases many projectiles in quick succession and can potentially grant Oil Panic many charges during the same use.

So, to reiterate:

1 charge = 12% damage
2 charges = 24% damage
3 charges = 36% damage

Metmetm3t's frame data thread contains more information about this, so here's a direct quote from it that goes over Oil Panic in a much more detailed and animated manner:

This thread we're in right now should probably be unstickied; it's out of date and could possibly be misleading those who are unfamiliar with the true nature of this move. Like I said, it's still useful for looking at what Oil Panic actually can absorb, but I think it would be better off as a normal thread (or, at the very least, updated with something in the title that says it's outdated) at this point to make things less confusing for everybody.